Brad Goy had 1,000 reasons to want the 1984 Amboy High School football team to win a state championship.

In the fall of 1983, Goy was a junior lineman for the Clippers. Amboy was 9-0 and the No. 2-ranked Class 2A team in the state, and faced a first-round playoff matchup against No. 1 Ottawa Marquette, which was also undefeated.

It was a state championship-quality game to open the playoffs, held on a Wednesday night back in those days. The Clippers and Crusaders battled back and forth, but in the end, it was Marquette that prevailed 16-12.

Afterward, in the tear-filled hallways at Amboy High School, the juniors on that team vowed they would not be in that position the following year. Goy, in fact, bet Mark Kaleel, a fullback on Amboy’s 1979 state runner-up team, $100 that the Clippers would win a state championship the following season.

Kaleel offered up 10-to-1 odds on that proposition, and Goy accepted. He knew that his class was loaded with talent, and would be regaining the services of Dennis Ely, a speedy back who missed his junior season with a knee injury suffered in a 3-wheeler accident just before preseason practice was to start.

“That team, when they were juniors, that’s really what made us a fairly good team when I was a senior,” said Gary Koch, a two-way starter for the 1983 club. “If it wasn’t for those guys, we wouldn’t have been near the team we were.”

A little more than a year later, the Clippers put the finishing touches on a 13-0 season and the first team state championship in school history. Goy was also in for a big payday from Kaleel, who would later become his brother-in-law.

“That was motivation right there,” Goy said with a laugh. “I did just make him pay the $100.”

The 1984 Amboy squad shared a trait – confidence, bordering on cockiness – that is
common among championship squads. They were in junior high when the golden age of Amboy football was in its infancy.

They were in the stands when the Clippers
finished second at state in 1979, and again in 1980. When they got to high school, they planned to finish the job.

“This was our goal since we were in 8th grade,” said Sam Jones, an anchor at defensive tackle. “There was probably nothing that was going to stop us.”

There were obstacles along the way, but nothing a confident crew couldn’t overcome. After a 5-0 start, quarterback Dan Etheridge went down with a broken left arm in Week 6 against Fulton. He got sacked, and in the process of trying to break his fall, his arm snapped.

“He was just screaming,” said Goy, the left tackle. “We all went back and looked, and bones were sticking out of his arm. It was gruesome.”

Ben Leake, a starting safety for the Clippers, took over at quarterback. Instead of teammates trying to pump him up in a tough spot, it was Leake who took charge immediately.

“We didn’t say a whole lot to Ben – he said it to us,” Ely said. “He came in and he said, ‘All right guys, this isn’t the end of the game. We’re running the 42 option pass, touchdown, and this is for Dan.’ That’s a bomb, right off the bat, on his first play.

“He threw it, and it was to me. I had to dive, and I caught it, but if he would have hit me in stride, it would have been a touchdown. I come back to the huddle, he slaps me on the back and says, ‘Sorry about that. I thought you were a little faster.’”

After a 9-0 regular season, the Clippers’ confident ways continued come playoff time. Before a second-round game against the Wethersfield Flying Geese, four Clippers (Goy, Dennis Ely, Brian Ely, and Leake) went duck hunting that morning. After a 34-6 rout, they hunted some more.

“We got quite a few in the morning,” Dennis Ely said, “so we went back and got some more.”

Before a semifinal game against Woodstock Marian, Goy and Dennis Ely went deer hunting.

“Coach [Don] Wyzgowski said don’t get up too early,” Goy said. “When I got to the school, he asked if I went hunting, and I said yes I did. He just smiled at me.”

When asked who the spiritual ringleader of the 1984 team was, Goy, Dennis Ely, and Jones agreed it was Tony Albiero, a fearsome linebacker and offensive guard. He was a terror on defense, with 128 tackles, two interceptions and two fumble recoveries.

Albiero riled up his teammates with pregame dances on tables and benches, with Queen’s “We are the Champions” playing at ear-splitting volume. After games, it was Albiero dancing again, to another ditty by Queen, “Another One Bites the Dust.”

“He’d get everybody fired up,” Ely said.